Colossians Chapter 2
A bit of info on Gnosticism:
- Gnosticism is the belief that human beings contain a piece of God (the highest good or a divine spark) within themselves, which has fallen from the immaterial world into the bodies of humans. All physical matter is subject to decay, rotting, and death. Those bodies and the material world, created by an inferior being, are therefore evil. Trapped in the material world, but ignorant of its status, the pieces of God require knowledge (gnosis) to inform them of their true status. That knowledge must come from outside the material world, and the agent who brings it is the savior or redeemer.- World History Encyclopedia
- A Gnostic, after being awakened, studied the heavens and learned the means to navigate the various layers. In this sense, Gnostics viewed salvation as an individual matter, rather than involving the rest of the community. In other words, salvation could not be achieved through the cross, church hierarchy, or rules.
- Once one successfully made it through the upper atmosphere, one's spark, now home, united with the godhead; in some systems one became God.
- In Gnostic systems, there is a denial of what was becoming standard Christian teaching, eschatology, or the future return of Christ to usher in the kingdom of God. For Gnostics, the kingdom is within the individual.
